Summer of Schism: Gregory Cameron on the 'dark side'

Canon Gregory Cameron, deputy general secretary at the Anglican Communion Office and the architect of the Covenant, has as we report delivered a strong speech at the Dean's Library in St Asaph. You can download the entire lecture here . He warned Anglicans against making homosexuality a "shibboleth"  but also criticised the "dark side" of western Anglicanism which assumes superiority over Anglicans in the developing world.

Canon Cameron said that senior clerics in the Western church were in danger of adopting a NATO-style attitude of "intellectual superiority". He criticised the US church for placing "implicit obligations" on the recipients of their largesse and pointed out that the image of the typical Anglican has changed. "The average Anglican is a black woman under the age of 30, who earns two dollars a day, has a family of  at least three children, has lost two close relatives to AIDs, and who will walk four miles to Church for a three hour service on a Sunday."

Canon Cameron, who was Dr Rowan Williams' chaplain in Wales, said: "The challenge of the life of the Communion is such at the moment that if we cannot express the ties that hold us together, then we are condemned to a far more serious fate."

Referring to the Hebrew Bible's Book of Judges, he said this "rather bloody episode of  internecine warfare" involved Israelite tribes, the Ephraimites and Gileadites, who had been  united against a common enemy, turning against each other.

"The flashpoint occurs at a place named in the text as the Falls of the Jordan," he  said."Every Ephraimite seeking to cross the river is questioned by the Gileadites.  If they  cannot pronounce the word 'shibboleth' correctly, thus proving themselves aliens, they are slaughtered, and the Scriptures – a little too gleefully for modern tastes - recalls that 42,000 Ephraimites  - a tribe enrolled in the Old Testament among the tribes of Israel, note - are killed as a result of this episode."

He said the ties of friendship in the Anglican Communion were still strong. "In fact, it is interesting to note that of the six Anglican primates in Britain and Ireland, three have Welsh backgrounds, the Primate of All Ireland is English, and the English primates are Welsh and Ugandan."

But he continued: "Alongside these ties of friendship - the so-called bonds of affection which have been described as holding the Anglican Communion together – there has lurked an unconscious sense of superiority and dependency: a sense that all the really educated theologians find their homes in Oxbridge, and that all the really big money comes from the United States. 

"It has been said, with a certain sense of irony, that in the Anglican Communion, the Africans pray, the Americans pay, and the English write all the documents."

He continued: "The dark side to the life of the Anglican Communion is that too often the theological  graduates of the seminaries of the NATO alliance do unconsciously adopt an air of educational superiority, while many American church leaders do not even seem to notice, even while they often unconsciously rely upon, the implicit obligations which they place on the recipients of their largesse." 

He implied there were grounds for the criticisms made by the evangelicals. "Not only are we in the West shrinking in numbers unlike the growing Churches of the South; for many critics, the Churches of the West are losing a sense of their identity as they get lulled into the liberalism and relativism which are presumed to be the hallmarks of the modern Western society."

Comments

[Paul]

TJM - agreed, the concerns will be addressed - The Archbishop said as much when he said "I have no doubt that the Lambeth Conference will wish to affirm all these positive aspects of GAFCON’s deliberations" - just no one heard him. For a conference with no resolutions that is quite a statement. Paul

[tjmcmahon]

This address strikes me as quite important, especially juxtaposed with the Archbishop's recent statement on Gafcon. Given that it is unlikely that Canon Cameron would act outside the will of the Archbishop, one is led to conclude that this lecture is a low keyed way of letting the Global South know that many of their expressed concerns are indeed to be considered and addressed, regardless of public disagreements over ecclesiology.

Within the US, many of us see the "summer of schism" as having occurred in 2003- when TEC "walked apart" from the Communion. The sensationalism surrounding Gafcon, Lambeth, and the following TEC bishops' meeting is not an aid to the strained relations between Canterbury and what appears to be the orthodox majority of the world wide Communion.

[David, Cambridge]

So you shouldn't make homosexuality a shibboleth? Funny that, this is exactly what Lindsay German of the Socialist Workers' Party told her members when the SWP was trying to cosy up to reactionary Muslim fundamentalists (just Google shibboleth and swp). Its nice to see that extremists of all types are being wrongfooted by trying to use sexuality for their own cynical political ends.

[Pluralist]

I am not "lulled" into liberalism and relativism. I am these, consciously and by choice.

[robroy]

The sin is on the heads of those who have transgressed and those who have opposed addressing the problems through dissemblings and deceit and allowed it to grow to crisis proportions.

Rowan Williams and the ACO have consistently avoided the hard choices of leadership. This is exemplified by the subcommittee report written by ACO bureaucrats and attempted to be pushed through by RW in Tanzania (despite one subcommittee member not even having seen the document). But it probably best seen in the "indaba" format of Lambeth, seemingly scripted by the Americans, to avoid any consequences of their actions.

[Bishop Alan]

Ruth, many many thanks for really helpful resource here...

[Robert Ian Williams]

The liberal establishment seem to be in denial that there is a revolt on their hands.

yes there is western manipulation and money, but there are also genuine concerns.

[Chris Gillibrand]

PS
The Church of England has no compass- it was always divided into three factions who pulled it in their own direction with almost balanced weight, so one never knew in which direction it was heading next. I am celebrating this month 20 years in the barque of St Peter, well-known for the navigational abilities of the Captain- headed for the sure port of Roman security.

[Chris Gillibrand]

Of the six ordinands in a Welsh diocese not too many years ago, the three English stayed in Wales, learning the language as their price of entry into civilised society, while the three Welsh plied their trade in London. Funny old world!

[Michael Stevens]

The Church has changed there is no doubt about that, and this must be dealt with, but surely this requires dialogue on both sides, not a one way set of threats from either.